Falling Over Sideways

By Jordan Sonnenblick

A girl navigates the chaos of eighth grade while handling a family tragedy in this funny and honest novel by the author of Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie. 

Claire’s life is a joke . . . but she’s not laughing. While her friends seem to be leaping forward, she's dancing in the same place. The mean girls at school are living up to their mean name, and there’s a boy, Ryder, who’s just as bad, if not worse. And at home, nobody’s really listening to her—if anything, they seem to be more in on the joke than she is.

Then into all of this (not-very-funny-to-Claire) comedy comes something intense and tragic—while her dad is talking to her at the kitchen table, he falls over with a medical emergency. Suddenly the joke has become very serious—and the only way Claire, her family, and her friends are going to get through it is if they can find a way to make it funny again.

Praise for Falling Over Sideways

“It’s a powerful and profound look at a family coping with unexpected change.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review

“Authentic, funny, dramatic, fantastic.” —Kirkus Reviews

 “[Sonnenblick]does an exceedingly good job developing his adolescent characters . . . I would highly recommend this novel for any collection serving a middle school audience.” —School Library Journal

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: Sep 27, 2016
• ISBN: 9780545863261

Jordan Sonnenblick

Jordan Sonnenblick is the author of the acclaimed teen novels Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie, Notes from the Midnight Driver, and Zen and the Art of Faking it. In addition to being a writer, he’s a middle-school English teacher and would never penalize one of his students for bringing an imaginary friend to school. Jordan lives in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, with his wife and their two children. If he’s ever had an imaginary friend, he’s not telling! You can visit him on the Web at www.jordansonnenblick.com.

Reviews for Falling Over Sideways

[reader1009-863136 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

*Thanks to Scholastic and the SLJ Teen Live virtual conference for providing me a free copy to review*

teen/middlegrade fiction. As if being in 7th grade isn't painful enough, Claire's famous teen novelist dad suffers a major stroke and loses his ability to talk, eat, or walk without lots of help. This was the first Sonnenblick I've read and while the 2nd-4th chapters were on the whiny/angsty side (while the setting and characters were being established), I thoroughly enjoyed the characters, the drama and laughter and yes, I also cried. I liked the thoughtfully researched realism of the medical/paramedic parts and look forward to reading JS' other works.

[ewyatt_16 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Claire is an eighth grade girl worried that she didn't get placed in the higher level dance classes with her BFFs. One morning she's home with her dad when something weird starts happening, she calls 911 and soon is trying to navigate her dad having a stroke. Each member of the family deals with this in different ways. Claire is angry. Her brother Matthew, a high achiever, gives up a lot to help care for their dad. Claire kind of grew on me and I liked the story more as it went along. The story was touching by the end - watching the family work to recover, heal, and take care of each other. There is levity in the story along with the emotions.

[mikitchenlady · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Claire is having a terrible time in 8th grade. She gets picked on by the mean girls at school plus her former friend, Ryan, who does his best to lower her self-confidence so he can retain first chair in the saxophone section. At her dance studio, her two good friends have been promoted to the next level of classes, leaving her with most of the elementary school kids. She as a crazy science teacher who tells them all they should be just like her daughter Meredith. And her parents just don't get it. One day, after arguing with her dad, the kitchen table slams into her - her father collapses while having a stroke. Claire can't reach her mother, so calls 911 and manages to hold it together until the emergency team gets there and whisks her father to the hospital. The stroke impacts Dad's language area, particularly unfortunate since he is a writer. Eventually, Dad comes home but struggles to even feed himself. Claire is still unhappy about her life circumstances, tries to keep it all from everyone, and puts all of her efforts into succeeding at school and dance, avoiding spending time with her father. A pneumonia setback brings it all to a head - can Claire help her dad and manage to get her life together?Sonnenblick excels at showing us how hard it is to deal with a parent with a medical condition, how it impacts the whole family especially the children. Sometimes the problems Claire faces fall a bit into hyperbole, but perhaps that just reflects how 8th grade girls feel. This would be a good title for health classes, but really most middle and junior high students will like it. It's nice to see a book about how families pull it together in challenging circumstances.

[paperdolllady · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Eighth grader, Claire, is a treasure. The comic and tragic are so well-blended in this young adult novel, and the story moves forward with ease as the reader gets to know its heroic characters.

[acargile-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This novel is realistic fiction.Claire is a bit of an immature teen, but you’ll see you or some of your friends in her because she’s very typical. She isn’t as good at dance as she’d like and doesn’t get to advance in dance class with her friends. She feels she’s with the babies and doesn’t have a great attitude. Her brother is perfect--he has great grades, a girlfriend, and teachers like him. Her parents don’t understand her and have a tendency to see humor in situations that Claire doesn’t find humorous.One morning Claire is alone with her father having breakfast together when he falls over sideways. She’s able to call 911 and get him to the hospital in time to get medication when it’s determined he’s had a stroke. The rest of her school year consists of the family working to get dad through therapy and try to get his sense of humor and independence back. Claire is also trying to improve on dance, compete with her instrument against her nemesis, and stand up against the mean science teacher who compares everyone to her daughter.I was surprised that Sonnenblick wrote a book with a female lead--he’s obviously been around girls a lot. Usually, Sonnenblick has male protagonists, and the books are my “go to” books for 8th grade boys. Not only did the girl protagonist surprise me, but the book is geared for any grade level in middle school. This is a good choice for those of you who like realistic novels. I liked it.

[edgoldberg · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Claire is not having a good day. It is the Dad’s Dance at her dance school. It occurs when the students turn 14 and she and her dad have been looking forward to this for forever. Unfortunately she is watching all the other girls dance with their dads because hers can’t dance, not since his stroke almost a year ago.Falling Over Sideways flashes back to the events leading up to her father’s stroke and takes them forward to the present. The night before his stroke, Claire and her dad had an argument, Claire being the drama queen and her father making light of the situation. The next morning, when just the two of them were at breakfast, her dad stood up and, all of the sudden, listed to one side, mumbling gibberish. Panicking, she called her mother who, true to form, had her cell phone turned off. Next was 911. She rode with her dad to the hospital, all the while feeling that in some way, she caused the stroke. As Jordan Sonnenblick has done with After Ever After and Notes From the Midnight Driver, two of my favorite Sonnenblick books, he uses humor to tell what is generally serious stories. Claire goes through so many stages: guilt at possibly being the cause of the stroke, denial, fear of the future, shame. She’s afraid to tell her best friends. She’s afraid to be with her father who is not nearly the man he used to be. All the while, Claire must deal with the trials and tribulations of middle school life, which we all know can be traumatic. Claire’s feelings and actions are contrasted with her mother’s and brother’s actions and emotions, since we know everyone handles trauma differently.We tend to think that strokes only occur in older people, but Falling Over Sideways was inspired, in part, by a teenage friend of Sonnenblick’s son whose father had a stroke. Much of Claire’s actions and emotions are based on this.Sonnenblick gets his point across without beating you over the head. Falling Over Sideways is a great read.